Reflexiones de los docentes sobre el perfil del futuro economista de la UAZ

The policy appraisal of the different approaches to selecting lone parents for work activation in this thesis will attempt answers to two aspects of the question ‘what works’: The first part is to investigate the potential of the reform and the second part is to examine the likelihood of a substantial proportion moving into work as a result of the targeting by age of child. In order to assess the potential impact that targeting this group could have, three hypothetical scenarios are examined. First of all, there is what could be called the best case scenario, that is what would be the effect on the overall employment rate of lone parents if the activation was completely successful and 100 per cent of the target group moved into employment. Perhaps more realistically, a second hypothetical scenario is focusing on the employment target. In other words, what proportion of lone parents in the target group would need to move into employment for the overall employment target to be met? This will be referred to as the employment target scenario. Finally, as discussed above, the employment target is seen as a policy lever used to meet the child poverty target. Harker et al estimated that the overall employment rate of lone parents would have to rise to 86 per cent in order for the child poverty target to be met all else being equal (2006; 13)

28. Therefore, the child poverty target scenario will examine what proportion of the target group would need to move into employment for the overall employment rate to increase to 86 per cent.

Estimating the likely as opposed to the potential success of the reform is more difficult. However, one indicator is the steady-state employment rate, i.e. the employment rate of lone parents in previous years. Therefore, I will be looking at the employment rate of all lone parents and that of the activation target group in particular from 2002 to 2005 onwards. The development of the employment rate over these four years will then be projected forward in order to estimate the employment rate of lone parents if the reform either had not been introduced or did not have any effects. This scenario will be referred to as the counterfactual or steady-state scenario and give an indication of the likely future development of the lone parent employment rate if no substantial changes were to take place in the next few years.

28 Alternatively, if the employment target of 70 per cent was met for lone parents by 2010, then the proportion of dual earner couples would need to rise from 57 to 65 per cent and the proportion of unemployed couples fall from 5 to 4 per cent (Harker 2006; 13). The 86 per cent figure is used for illustration purposes as increasing the employment rate of lone parents is not the only policy lever the government can and is using to meet the child poverty target.

Further to the examination of the likely success of the design of the current welfare-to-work reform the characteristics of lone parents in and out of work will be compared. The differences in certain characteristics between those two groups have emerged as a key feature in government sponsored research on lone parents and non-employment (see chapter three for a fuller discussion of this literature). Over time, a number of characteristics such as the number of children, health status and recent work experience, have been shown to be associated with not being in employment. The government argues that lone parents with older children are generally ‘able to work’. Thus, one would expect the two groups to be similar across other characteristics affecting whether a lone parents is in work or not.

.

Having identified the relevant characteristics as stand alone factors, the number of lone parents facing multiple disadvantages, when it comes to moving into employment will be examined. Berthoud (200a3) has investigated the concept of multiple barriers, with regards to the likelihood of labour market entry and found that a cumulative model is the best predictor for labour market entry, i.e. taking into account both the number of barriers, as well as the effect of certain combinations of these. Berthoud (2003a) focused on the following disadvantages: when comparing the effect of multiple disadvantages on the three groups studied in his analysis (disabled people, people over 50 and lone parents):

• Age,

• family structure,

• skill level,

• ethnic group,

• labour demand and

• health status.

According to Berthoud (2003a) even a straightforward additive model of multiple disadvantages is almost as good at predicting the risk of non-employment as more sophisticated models combining particular disadvantages. Therefore, such an additive model is applied in this thesis. For the analysis of the effect of multiple disadvantages on the labour market entry of lone parents over time, Berthoud (2003a) only used personal factors such as age or health for his model rather than the full list above.

The list of multiple disadvantages used in this thesis is a combination of the original list used by Berthoud (2003a) and the key characteristics associated with not being

in work as highlighted by existing research on lone parents. Three factors on Berthoud’s list have been either taken out or replaced. The first, and most obvious, is that of family status as the current analysis is focusing on one family status, namely that of lone parenthood. Also, ethnicity does not affect the likelihood of a lone parent to be in employment in the same way it does for the rest of the working age population: given the small sample size numbers, all minority ethnic groups would have be treated as one. Yet, the employment rate of Afro-Caribbean lone parents is higher than that of White lone parents while that of most other minority ethnic groups is lower substantially. Therefore, ethnicity has been taken out of the analysis.

Finally, the age of individuals has been left out of the analysis because the age of the lone parent tends to be linked to that of the child and most of the policy approaches use the age of a child as part of their selection mechanism.

In contrast, skills, health status and labour demand have been kept and two factors added to the list of multiple disadvantages for this research. Based on the review of the available research carried out in chapter three, recent work experience has been highlighted as enhancing the employability of an individual, particularly in the low skilled sector. Therefore, time spent on Income Support has been included in the list.

Similarly, having three or more children is frequently mentioned as a characteristic associated with not being in work and has therefore been included as well.

Hence, the five factors included in the list of multiple disadvantages are:

• Having three or more children,

• Not having any qualifications,

• Having been on Income Support for six or more years²⁹ ,

• Either the lone parent or at least one child to have an impairment that is expected to last for at least a year and limits either the amount or kind of work the parent can engage in and

• Living in the government region with the lowest employment rate.

Other characteristics associated with non-employment have not been included for a number of reasons. Being a social tenant is not in the list used as it applies to around two thirds of lone parents on Income Support and is therefore not suitable for making

29 Ideally this characteristic would also account for lone parents never having been in work as it is otherwise biased towards older lone parents. However, currently this variable is not available in the earlier datasets (2002 to 2004). Therefore, it has been left out of the 2005 analysis as well in order to be able to compare across the different waves.

distinctions within that group. Marital status has not been included in the analysis either as the variable available in FACS does not isolate cohabitation. Therefore,

‘single’ lone parents were either single when giving birth to their child or has previously been cohabitating. In addition to the problems mentioned with both tenure and marital status, the direct effect of either on the likelihood of being in work is less clear than with characteristics such as health and qualifications. Both martial status and tenure seem to refer to socio-economic circumstances prior to becoming a lone parent and associated with that aspect social capital not captured in FACS. As has been discussed in the previous chapter further questions regarding work orientation have been added in the more recent waves of FACS, however, they are not available for analysis at this stage.

In sum, a list of multiple disadvantages has been applied in this context for three reasons: Firstly, the list of multiple disadvantages is used as a way to summarise the differences in characteristics between those on Income Support and those in work.

Moreover, it can be used to differentiate within the welfare reform target group by their likelihood of moving into work. Finally, the distribution of multiple disadvantages can then also be used to compare the distribution of multiple disadvantages across the different target groups as an indicator of ‘ability to work’.

4.4 Identifying alternative approaches to selecting lone parents for